Guidance

Newsletter 146 — January 2023

Updated 1 February 2023

1. Relief at source

1.1 Notification of residency status report for 2023 to 2024

You should now have received your January 2023 notification of residency status reports.

You should have received an email and a reminder when your file was available for you to download. As explained in the email, you had 6 days (144 hours starting from when we made the report available to you) to download your file.

Email us at: reliefatsource.administration@hmrc.gov.uk and put ‘Relief at source — January 2023 residency report’ in the subject line if you:

• did not receive your report and you submitted your annual return of information for the previous tax year
• have questions about the data within your report

1.2 If you did not receive a notification of residency status report

If you did not receive a residency report in January 2023, you can check your members’ residency status for relief at source. You can check the residency tax status for single or multiple members or default to the UK basic rate for your members.

You should also use this service to check a member’s residency status if they:

• do not appear on your notification of residency status report
• are unmatched

Use the rest of UK residency status if:

• you cannot check a member’s status before you apply for relief at source for them
• they do not appear on either the residency report or the look up service

You must not apply a tax rate based on the member’s address.

Once you have used a residency status to claim relief at source for a member, you must use this for the whole of the tax year, even if their residency status changes.

2. Pension flexibility statistics

HMRC can now give more information on the number of tax repayment claim forms processed for pension flexibility payments.

From 1 October 2022 to 31 December 2022 we processed:

• 8,496 P55 forms
• 4,170 P53Z forms
• 1,669 P50Z forms

Total value repaid: £45,026,065

The tax repayment figures for the period 1 January 2023 to 31 March 2023 will be published in Pensions schemes newsletter ― April 2023

3. Managing Pension Schemes service

3.1 Event Reporting

In pension schemes newsletter 143 — September 2022 we told you we’d be releasing the event report for 2023 to 2024 on the Managing Pension Schemes service.

From April 2023, you will no longer be able to compile and submit any new event reports for the tax year 2023 to 2024 onwards on the Pension Schemes Online service.

If you need to submit any new event reports for tax year 2023 to 2024 onwards, you’ll need to migrate your pension scheme and submit the report on the Managing Pension Schemes service. You can only submit your event report once the tax year has ended, unless you are reporting that the pension scheme has wound up, or that it has become or ceased to be a Master Trust.

If you need to submit a new event report or amend an existing event report for the tax year 2022 to 2023 or earlier, you can continue to do this on the Pension Schemes Online service.

From April 2023, you’ll no longer be able to submit any event reports for any period using third party software on the Pension Schemes Online service. You’ll need to compile and submit the report directly on the relevant service.

In summer 2023, pension scheme administrators and practitioners will be able to create, compile and view the event report in-year on the Managing Pension Scheme service.

There’ll be no limit on the number of members or events that can be reported in a single event report. You’ll also be able to enter details of all types of lifetime allowance protection reference numbers. We’ll provide further updates and guidance in future newsletters.

There will be a period between April 2023 and summer 2023 where pension scheme administrators and practitioners will be unable to create and compile an event report for 2023 to 2024 on either service. We’ll provide further updates and guidance on what to do during this period in future newsletters.

3.2 Pension scheme return

In 2024, we will introduce the functionality to submit a pension scheme return (PSR) on the Managing Pension Schemes service. This means when you receive a notice to file a Pension scheme return for the tax year ending 5 April 2024, you’ll submit the return on this service.

For schemes migrated or registered using this service, you (or a practitioner acting on your behalf) will have to compile and submit the Pension scheme return on the Managing Pension Schemes service by the relevant due date.

Once you’ve submitted the pension scheme return through the service, you’ll be able to amend the return if necessary.

The questions on the pension scheme return will change and more detail will be required, in some cases including details of your members and certain transactions that have taken place during the period of the return. As is currently the case, you’ll only need to submit a pension scheme return for a pension scheme if you receive a notice to file from HMRC. Whether or not you have a received a notice to file previously is no indication of whether you’ll be issued with one in future.

To ensure you have the most amount of time to complete your pension scheme return on the Managing Pensions Schemes service, you’ll need to make sure you’ve migrated your scheme by April 2024. From this date, when a scheme is migrated, notices to file for any applicable years will automatically be issued, backdated to the tax year 2023 to 2024.

3.3 Pension scheme migration

Take action to migrate your pension schemes to the Managing Pension Schemes service.

To migrate your pension schemes, log in to the Managing Pension Schemes service and select ‘Add a pension scheme from the Pension Schemes Online service’ and select each scheme you need to migrate.

If you’ve incorrectly tried to re-register an existing pension scheme that you’re an administrator for, email migration.mps@hmrc.gov.uk and put ‘Incorrect scheme registration’ in the subject line. Do not select ‘apply to register a new pension scheme’.

You can find further guidance on migrating your pension schemes to the Managing Pension Schemes service on GOV.UK.

3.4 How you can help us

We’re looking for scheme administrators and practitioners to help us improve the development of features on the Managing Pension Schemes service, in particular the pension scheme return.

You can take part in user research and give us feedback by joining the Managing Pension Schemes user panel. As a member of the panel, we’ll only contact you about the Managing Pension Schemes service and you can get involved in testing new features and providing feedback on the service.

Your input will be invaluable to helping influence the future design and development of the service.

You can also email feedback to pensionsprogramme@hmrc.gov.uk using ‘Managing Pension Schemes service — feedback’ in the subject line.’

4. Accounting for Tax (AFT) returns

4.1 Filing Accounting for Tax returns

All Accounting for Tax returns for any quarter beginning on or after 1 April 2020 must now be submitted on the Managing Pension Schemes service.

If you need to submit a return for the quarter 1 October 2022 to 31 December 2022 and you have not already migrated your pension scheme, you’ll need to do this and submit the return on the Managing Pension Schemes service by the filing deadline of 14 February 2023, to avoid interest and penalties.

Find information on how to submit an Account for Tax return using the Managing Pension Schemes service.

4.2 Changes to Accounting for Tax

For the AFT for all quarters beginning 1 April 2023 onwards, you will see new questions on the annual allowance (AA) and lifetime allowance (LTA) sections. These new questions will only apply to pension schemes impacted by the public service pensions remedy (also known as the ‘McCloud judgment’).

For pension schemes impacted by the public service pensions remedy, as a result of the new questions, the bulk upload CSV templates will change for Annual Allowance and Lifetime Allowance. We’ll provide further details in a future newsletter, but if you would like us to send you the updated spreadsheets when they’re available, email pensions.administration@hmrc.gov.uk and put ‘Updated AFT CSV file’ in the subject line.

For any pension schemes not impacted by the public service pension remedy, you can continue to use the existing CSV templates. When the new questions are available on the Account For Tax return, you’ll be given the option of both versions of the CSV templates.

Both versions of the template will be available on the service from 1 April 2023.

5. Pension scheme transfers

We have updated our guidance on transferring a pension scheme member’s savings.

This means that when you contact HMRC to confirm the status of the receiving scheme, you can now request a response to be emailed to you.

To do this, you’ll need to:

1. Read CC/FS72 DSC1 Corresponding with HMRC by email.
2. Confirm you have read and agree with the guidance by stating ‘I have read and agree to the HMRC email protocol.’ in your letter or in the ‘Please use this space to enter your question(s):’ box at the bottom of the online form.

You’ll need to do this every time you submit a request, or we will reply to you by post.